There is hardly a week or weekend that goes by without news of car crashes on our highways or within city limits. One too many of them are fatal. Whether you are a driver, passenger, cyclist or pedestrian, once you’re out on the road you get to see it up close and it is scary.

I was driving through the downtown, down 4th Avenue when I got startled by yelling and hand-waving coming out of a car parked on the side of the street. A bunch of teenage girls in an SUV were trying to get people to let them join traffic, making silly faces and acting in a rather annoying manner.

It would
have been too easy to roll my eyes and say ‘Ugh, teenagers…’. After all, I have
seen grownups acting in awful ways while in traffic or making rookie mistakes.

I cannot tell you how many times I wished that Styrofoam food containers would disappear. Call it a pet peeve but it goes beyond that. They leach harmful (albeit slow-acting and invisible) endocrine disruptors in the food stored in them, they are non-recyclable and indestructible, and one too many can be seen lying around parks or washing on river shores once the humans that emptied them have long left the scene.

The distance between my car and the one that swerved out of the lineup of cars waiting at a stop sign became very small, very fast. The driver had likely waited for a while (like everyone else in that long lineup waiting to turn right on 10th Ave. from Lorne St.) but his patience expired and he opted to break the line and turn left into incoming traffic. That was me, and the rest of the cars following. His maneuver was quick, and illegal too.

It was scary, though I was alone in the car. Had I not swerved
the car to avoid impact, the passenger side would have been smashed quite badly.
‘What if’ is not a good question to have to ask while driving midday through
town.

No matter how many times I see it, I never get tired of it: The emerald sheen of the surrounding hills this time of the year, the play of cloud shadows and sunshine which makes the grasslands look as if you’re gliding over in a boat and looking down at the sun-kissed grassy bottom of a shallow creek. It’s magical, there is no other way to put it.

I am nursing a recently injured knee so I am cautious while
hiking but there is too much beauty to miss if I hold back. After a few days of
taking it easy, I venture up the trails again in my favourite park of all.

If you were to sit with us for dinner on any given night, you would be privy to a recurrent conversation that surfaces whenever social issues such as poverty, violation of human rights and modern-day slavery, refugee and climate change-caused disasters are brought to our attention via news, books or any other sources: why don’t wealthy people help more? And why do some choose to act in ways that take away from those who have little to begin with?

Every now and then I play an interesting game with myself. I
deliberately avoid buying more food when we still have enough supplies in the house
to make a few more meals. The process conjures creativity but that’s what makes
it interesting. That’s where empowerment sprouts.

Seriously though, why
do it?

Why not decide on a menu and then shop for ingredients? Spoiler
alert: this is not a cooking post; as you will see below, it goes far beyond
that. Why cook with whatever available, when available? Because: